which sand?

[Lyotim88]

hows the ocean direct caribbean live sand?

 

[spike78]

Coarse sand is going to mess you up, especially at that depth. If you want a working DSB, you want to stick with find sand at depths 4" or greater up to a max of 8". The coarse sand won't allow the infauna to maintain it properly.

I really recommend pinking up Dr. Shimek's Sand Bed Secrets book. It goes through step by step on how to construct a DSB. I've had mine in my 200 now for 2 years with no problems.

 

[spike78]

I just recently picked up 40 ponds of caribsea sugar sized aragonite to replenish my sand bed. I was really impressed. The sand was super-fine and didn't blow around at all.

http://www.caribsea.com/pages/products/dry_aragonite.html

 

[Lyotim88]

but why does the aragamax sand say it's good for UP TO an inch?

 

[spike78]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14784376#post14784376 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Lyotim88
but why does the aragamax sand say it's good for UP TO an inch?

I'm sorry, I don't see that anywhere. DSB's are generally defined as being from 4 - 8".

 

[Lyotim88]

its here in the description

 

[reefscape15]

Stick with a finer grain sand. I've liked the results with Natures Ocean. I have about 30lbs fiji pink and 40lbs Black Beach, and i'm planning on another 40lbs of the Black beach

 

[Fluid]

+1 Nature's Ocean.

 

[Kenmx10]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14787018#post14787018 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by spike78
I'm sorry, I don't see that anywhere. DSB's are generally defined as being from 4 - 8".

Not sure. Probably just thier recommendation. There are plenty of people with deep beds with fine sand. I have the same sand at 4" and its just fine. Its really just your prefrence. I would save as much money as you can on things like sand, and get the best skimmer you possibly can.

 

[cardiffgiant]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14774427#post14774427 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Lyotim88
i think im going to get the fiji pink. anybody have experience with this?

I went with one bag of fiji pink and one bag of special grade. I wanted all special grade, but could only find a bag of each and "needed it now." I've been very very happy with that mix.

 

[Lyotim88]

i just went ahead and bought the fiji pink

 

[AJSTITAN14]

The reason fine sand is better for live filtration is that you have massively more surface area for the volume for bacteria to grow on. The microorganisms live on the surface of the sand grains. From our cellular biology class we know that as surface area is squared volume is cubed so an equivalent volume of sand vs. gravel has exponentially more surface area.